Unable to get FAST Z-II mode working

[Leifern]

Hi there,

I recently got a DCE Cybervision 64/3D to use with my Elbox ZIV busboard. My hope was that I would get a better performance out of the setup as both the busboard and the DCE cybervision support the fast Z-II mode (which is supposedly about twice as fast as ZorroII). I'm running an A1200 with Blizzard 1260@66.
There is a jumper on the busboard to enable and disable fast Z-II mode but sysspeed shows the exact same results with the jumper closed or open.
Am i missing something? Is anyone here familiar with the setup and perhaps can help me troubleshoot?

Compared to sysspeeds A2k , picassoIV module my graphics setup is about half the performance (which is also a bit strange), and compared to my other CV64/3D in my A3000 (030@25) my A1200 setup is about five times faster. I assume the CPU is bottlenecking the A3000. The DCE has the wire jumper (that should signal it's ready for fast Z-II) and the busboard was recently recapped. Both are working flawlessly and stable in every other way. I would really like to unlock this fast Z-II mode but I'm not sure what to do here.

All thoughts and ideas are welcome

[Leifern]

Update:

I managed to get fast Z-II working with my Buddha 20th anniversary via the fastZII switch in ROM. It went from 2.3 mb/s to about 3.5 mb/s. Nice boost!
Now I just need to figure out how to get it working with my cybervision 64/3D.

[Matt_H]

Is it plugged into the right slot? As I recall,  not all of the slots are Fast Z-II capable.

My understanding is that there’s nothing to set on the CV itself. Just plug it in and it should go. Maybe your benchmark util isn’t running the right tests that would pick up the improved speed?

[Leifern]

Yes, it is plugged into the first slot, the two first are potential Fast Z-II slots.

I've run sysspeed's graphics test and several game comparisons (Quake68k timedemo performs exactly the same in ZII and Fast Z-II mode), all testes and comparisons in games and programs are exactly the same, shile performance should be increased across most if not all of them. I'm getting exactly no performance increase 

[lionstorm]

could it be that the cpu is the limiting factor here and not the graphic card speed ? just a wild guess...

[Leifern]

could it be that the cpu is the limiting factor here and not the graphic card speed ? just a wild guess...

The 060 @ 66 mhz? Seems very strange that it would be a limiting factor.

[jj]

I am not sure I ever noticed any difference , and I have the same setup (recently taken apart )

Does it say  anywhere it will be faster ?

Is normal zorro 2 already fast enough ?  i.e. is the zorro 2 bus  ( through the a1200 accelerator connector) slow enough to limit the data xfer to the card anyway

How does your benchmarks compare to that card in other amigas with similar cpus ?

There are all massive  guesses , and I could be talking shite

[Leifern]

Yes, the zorro-II bus is a severe bottleneck for most RTG-cards (not designed exclusively for Z-II). Sysspeed shows that an A4000 with an 060 and CV3DV in Zorro-III is about 5 times faster then my setup (graphics). Fast zorro-II was designed to decreese this performance gap. I dont have a zorro-III machine with an 060 yes myself so I am unable to test the CV3D on Zorro-III myself but i teust the sysspeed modules. According to elbox fast zorro-II is twice as fast as Zorro II on paper. I don't expect that kind of performan e bump but nothing at all seems wrong.

The ZIV busboard clearly says it supports fast Z-II and i got a healthy performan e increase with my buddha, and DcE's version of CV3D is the only RTG card i know that advertises to support fast Z-II. The CV3D cards with the red jumperwire are supposedly fast Z-II ready. Mine has such a wire.

[jj]

maybe my cv64/3d is not fast zorro 2 enabled.

Ive gone back to using my bvision anyway

[Leifern]

maybe my cv64/3d is not fast zorro 2 enabled.

Ive gone back to using my bvision anyway

At this point I'm wondering if any of them are.
The BVision is pretty damn sweet!

[Leifern]

It appears that CV64/3D might not support fast-ZII at all:
https://forum.icomp.de/index.php?thr...=7280#post7281

I guess the hardware databases should be notified about this.